DVDs
Iraq for Sale: The War Profiteers directed by Robert Greenwald
Filmmaker Robert Greenwald exposes Iraq War profiteering of staggering proportions by companies such as CACI, Blackwater and Halliburton subsidiary KBR. The movie co-stars the Republican Congress that's made it all possible by torpedoing virtually all Democratic attempts to launch investigations of the epic corruption. While the movie succeeds as polemic, it's considerably weaker as cinema: rough around the edges, not as tightly edited or polished as one might hope, some less-than accomplished graphics, etc. But considering that some elements of the movie took place as recently as August 2006, it probably couldn't be otherwise. Greenwald's selling the DVD directly here and asking buyers to hold screenings the week of October 8-14. This obviously presents Democrats with quite an opportunity. It's a safe bet that most Independents and more than a few Republicans will also find GOP-enabled war profiteering to be despicable in the extreme.
Iraq for Sale (2006) ... DVD released September 26, 2006 by Brave New Films
Good Night and Good Luck directed by George Clooney
Good Night and Good Luck is a great movie -- a masterpiece, really. It works superbly as both cinema and polemic, using gorgeous, smart, black-and-white filmmaking and a lush, jazz-based soundtrack to provide some timely reminders of who we're supposed to be and what we can become, better and worse. I don't think Clooney can be praised highly enough for this film that he co-wrote, directed, and in which he co-starred. Then there's David Strathairn, who clearly was born to play Ed Murrow. I especially appreciated some of Kenneth Turan's comments about his performance:
[T]he actor's innate air of gravitas and concern helps him appear more like Murrow than Murrow himself. ... The best part of Strathairn's haunted, haunting performance is his voice, the way he is able to uncannily reproduce Murrow's unmistakable cadences. A big chunk of Murrow's words in the film are taken directly from his speeches and on-air commentary, and hearing Strathairn read them is close enough to the real thing to be positively spooky.
The movie features a couple short excerpts of a speech Murrow gave nearly 50 years ago. Damn fine stuff.
Good Night and Good Luck (2005) ... DVD released March 14, 2006; Warner Home Video
Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price directed by Robert Greenwald
Critics were generous with praise on this documentary about the destruction that Wal-Mart wreaks, not only on many communities in which it settles, but on the world's economy as a whole. The number and diversity of interviewees who corroborate tales of Wal-Mart's rapaciousness is remarkable -- and perhaps irrefutable. It's not so much that Greenwald breaks a lot of new ground here, but that he found all the right people to interview in order to bring to life the stories we've been hearing for years. We see how Wal-Mart decimates family businesses, discriminates against women, underpays employees then suggests that they supplement their income with welfare, exploits Chinese laborers while undercutting American competitors, etc., etc. Especially disgusting is the segment about the Walton heirs' charitable giving. Wal-Mart delenda est.
*Also available in a print (paperback) edition.
Wal-Mart: The High Cost (2005) ... DVD released Nov. 15, 2005 by Brave New Films
This Divided State directed by Steven Greenstreet
All hell broke loose in ultra-conservative Orem, Utah just prior to the 2004 election, when students at Utah Valley State College invited Michael Moore to speak at their campus. While Utah went for Bush by well over 70 percent in 2004, Utah Valley State is clearly a refuge for lots of moderates and a few liberals, so the fur flew when one of Orem's most powerful far-right activists tried to prevent Moore's appearance.
While trying to squelch Moore, campus and community reactionaries simultaneously extended an invitation to Sean Hannity, asking him to pay them an emergency visit in order to counteract Moore's menace. Despite the vitriol that then gushed from all sides, filmmaker Greenstreet proves masterful at keeping things not only fair and balanced, but nuanced and good-natured as well. The disc comes with lots of extras, some of which are just as riveting as the main event. My favorite's "The Other Kay Anderson"; if everyone on the right were as sweet as that old character, there wouldn't be a problem.
This Divided State (2005) ... DVD released Sept. 27, 2005; The Disinformation Company
Born Into Brothels directed by Ross Kauffman and Zana Briski
Photojournalist Zana Briski's foray into a Calcutta red light district left her deeply sympathetic with the children who are literally born into brothels. Her efforts to help a few of them escape their environment are uplifting but never treacly, in part because only some of her highly laudable efforts bear fruit. This documentary makes a fine companion piece to Mira Nair's unforgettable 1988 masterpiece, Salaam Bombay!.
Distributing cameras to a handful of eager, young pupils, Briski teaches them the rudiments of her craft as they roam the district, sometimes capturing superb, haunting images of their world. Briski and the children use the kids' photos as vehicles to get them into boarding schools -- the only way out of cyclic poverty and prostitution. While their world's economy is based on prostitution, that activity is generally in the background. The children themselves are the stars of the film, which does a fine job of revealing their hopes, fears, strengths, and limitations.
Born Into Brothels (2003) ... DVD released September 20, 2005 by Thinkfilm
Monumental: David Brower's Fight for Wild America
directed by Kelly Duane
David Brower helped create modern American environmentalism, transforming the Sierra Club into a powerful and effective advocacy group and founding too many other major environmental organizations to list here. One movie couldn't possibly do it all justice, and Duane focuses mainly on the cinegenic Brower of the mid-20th century. Prior to World War II, Brower, like the Sierra Club, was largely devoted to mountaineering and other wilderness excursions into the Sierras. Brower started filming his adventures in the 1930s, later turning his filmmaking into a powerful tool on behalf of America's wild places. Monumental draws heavily on Brower's early "home movies," often using archival recordings of Brower himself as narrative, while weaving in lots of recent reminiscences from some of his associates. Also featured is a very nice, low-key musical score: several groups performing what might once have been called folk-rock.
Monumental (2004) ... DVD released September 20, 2005 by First Run Films
McLibel directed by Franny Armstrong
Poor Mickey D's just can't catch a break at the movies. Last year's Super Size Me documented Morgan Spurlock's near-fatal dalliance with a McDonald's-exclusive diet. Now comes the latest iteration of a doc about a McDonald's libel suit against two Brits who'd made the shocking, shocking allegations that McDonald's food is unhealthy and that the company exploits kids through its advertising. The story begins in 1986, when London Greenpeace (unrelated to Greenpeace) began circulating leaflets titled "What's wrong with McDonald's: Everything they don't want you to know." In 1990 the corporation sued London Greenpeace affiliates Dave Morris and Helen Steel for libel, but unlike others McDonald's had successfully bullied into silence, Morris and Steel pushed back. By the time the case was decided in 1997, it had cost the corporation an estimated £10 million. The seemingly never-ending tale is compelling to begin with, and Armstrong has turned it into effective cinema in a pleasingly low-budget sort of way. The Christian Science Monitor called it "a perfect antidote to the too-tricky documentary 'Super-Size Me.' "
McLibel (2005) ... DVD released August 30, 2005 by Cinema Libre Studio
Arguing the World directed by Joseph Dorman
A superb 1998 documentary, finally available on DVD. By focusing on the six decades' lives and work of four seminal political thinkers who met at New York's City College in the 1930s, Dorman traces the development of U.S. political thought -- left, center, and right -- from the Great Depression through the 1990s. Great interviews, apt archival materials, and crisp pacing provide a potent fix for political junkies.
Who knew that Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich had such strong links, via Irving Kristol and others, to Leon Trotsky? While one-time fellow traveler Kristol moved to the opposite end of the political spectrum, becoming the godfather of neoconservatism, Irving Howe largely stayed the course, founding the Democratic Socialists of America. Meanwhile, Nathan Glazer also played a role in the development of neoconservatism, while Daniel Bell moved to the center-left. A few '60s radicals discuss the importance of the four. In this long view, some of the former's Vietnam-era activism now comes off seeming pretty naive.
Arguing the World (1998) ... DVD released March 22, 2005 by First Run Features
Control Room directed by Jehane Noujaim
Director Jehane Noujaim (Startup.com) succeeds in letting her film's subjects -- Al-Jazeera, U.S. government officials, and American TV news networks -- speak for themselves in this illuminating look at the Iraq war and some of those who've covered it. The film watches the war unfold through the eyes of Al-Jazeera personnel at the U.S. military's media center at CentCom, in Qatar.
Many of the official briefings given to journalists are seen to be laughably inept attempts at spin by various U.S. spokespersons. In numerous cases, the official line is directly contradicted by well-corroborated and widely disseminated news reports of actual events. But the realtive openness, honesty, and intellectual curiosity of Marine Capt. Josh Rushing, a CentCom media liaison, contrasts sharply with all the official duplicity. Unfortunately, the Marine Corps explicitly forbade him from doing interviews about the movie, after which he terminated what had been a 14-year Marine career.
Control Room (2003) ... DVD released October 26, 2004 by Lions Gate
The Fog of War directed by Errol Morris
This Academy Award-winning documentary about Robert MacNamara and "lessons" that might be learned from the Vietnam War brings a calm, eerie detachment to subjects that usually engender fierce passions. MacNamara may still be one of the most widely and intensely despised men in America, but Morris's movie adds considerable dimension to its subject without getting exculpatory.
Riveting sequences of MacNamara speaking into the camera, culled from 20 hours of Errol Morris's recent interviews with the still very sharp octogenarian, are interwoven with archival footage to reveal some of the complexities of "McNamara's War," its namesake, and the many and varied positions of power he's held.
Morris is probably our best and certainly our most original major documentarian. While none of his other films are as overtly political as The Fog of War, they're startlingly compelling for other reasons. Morris' Thin Blue Line has been widely praised, as has his Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr., which is truly unforgettable.
The Fog of War (2004) ... DVD released May 11, 2004 by Sony Pictures
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